Page 41 - nostromo-a-tale-of-the-seaboard

eyes staring, necks extended, nostrils red, long tails stream-
ing. As soon as they had leaped upon the road the thick dust
flew upwards from under their hoofs, and within six yards
of Giorgio only a brown cloud with vague forms of necks
and cruppers rolled by, making the soil tremble on its pas-
sage.
Viola coughed, turning his face away from the dust, and
shaking his head slightly.
‘There will be some horse-catching to be done before to-
night,’ he muttered.
In the square of sunlight falling through the door Signo-
ra Teresa, kneeling before the chair, had bowed her head,
heavy with a twisted mass of ebony hair streaked with silver,
into the palm of her hands. The black lace shawl she used
to drape about her face had dropped to the ground by her
side. The two girls had got up, hand-in-hand, in short skirts,
their loose hair falling in disorder. The younger had thrown
her arm across her eyes, as if afraid to face the light. Lin-
da, with her hand on the other’s shoulder, stared fearlessly.
Viola looked at his children. The sun brought out the deep
lines on his face, and, energetic in expression, it had the im-
mobility of a carving. It was impossible to discover what he
thought. Bushy grey eyebrows shaded his dark glance.
‘Well! And do you not pray like your mother?’
Linda pouted, advancing her red lips, which were almost
too red; but she had admirable eyes, brown, with a sparkle
of gold in the irises, full of intelligence and meaning, and
so clear that they seemed to throw a glow upon her thin,
colourless face. There were bronze glints in the sombre clus-

0 Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard